So About The BARBIE “Snubs…”

Barbie.

It took 2023 by storm and had every sort of tie-in product imaginable. You could buy pool floaties, toothpaste, game consoles, and a never-ending stream of collectible toys. In short, Barbie (2023) was one of the biggest films of the year, and its cultural and economic impact was very profound. Regardless of whether you enjoyed it or found its message to be underdone, it is undeniable that this film influenced trends throughout the year, with an influx in sales for the Barbie brand, and profoundly more bubblegum pink clothing found in the wild than in previous years.

Revealing my cards: I was in the camp of people who really enjoyed the film. I saw it four times in theaters, and strangely, each time was a very different viewing experience for me. I went from 1) overwhelmed but having fun, to 2) enjoying it but questioning its messaging, to 3) not liking it at all, to 4) realizing that much of why I initially liked it had to do with a specific emotional response.

Barbie becomes a woman in the same way that a lot of girls do. It’s abrupt and difficult and as much as you don’t want it to happen, the world keeps changing and you just have to hold on.

(Full Letterboxd review exploring this idea)

But that being said, I entirely understand criticisms that have been made towards the film, particularly in regard to intersectionality, and some questionable choices regarding pacing. “I’m Just Ken” was about a minute and a half too long, and the end kinda falls apart once the Mattel executives show up in Barbieland. It’s a film that I enjoyed, but I certainly don’t think it was perfect, nor the best movie of 2023.

When the Oscar nominations were announced, there was uproar that I hadn’t anticipated. I was certain that Barbie would receive a ton of nominations, especially for music and production design, but I didn’t think that the acting categories would see any of our favorite plastic dolls. I was wrong, but not really in the way I could have anticipated being wrong.

Barbie was nominated for 8 Oscars preceding the 96th Academy Awards, though Margot Robbie did not receive a nomination for Best Actress, and Greta Gerwig did not receive a nomination for Best Director. There likely would have been some pushback if that headline stood on its own, but someone from the production did receive an acting nomination: Ryan Gosling for his portrayal of Ken.

There has been some outrage regarding the decision to nominate the main male actor for his portrayal in a film about the experiences of women, when the woman who starred in it (Robbie) and the woman who directed it (Gerwig) didn’t receive the “same” recognition.

Did Ryan Gosling have a better performance than Margot Robbie? Um….maybe? It’s hard to compare their performances in any way, though based on the number of “I Am Kenough” hoodies I’ve seen, Gosling definitely was a fan favorite. His comedy chops really shone in the role of Ken, and it was clear that he really threw himself into the role. Though, you can’t understate the importance of the director in coaxing out that performance, nor the rest of the ensemble’s talent. But is the backlash against him getting nominated while Gerwig and Robbie didn’t about the quality of performances? Not at all.

What becomes nominated at the Oscars isn’t really about recognizing the best of the best of the year. For starters, what is “good” is fairly subjective, but further, there is a select group of people that determine what will be nominated as the “best of the best,” and I find it difficult to believe that there are no social and industry pressures that influence what they decided gets to be nominated. There is little to no way that The Academy just watches every movie released in a year and objectively selects what was best. Particularly, when certain films gain much more cultural currency due to their popularity, which would make it difficult for such a popular award show to not recognize them. Award shows are political in who they decide to recognize, and who they don’t.

This isn’t a new revelation. Audiences of award shows are aware of the pretension, so the nomination of Ryan Gosling and the simultaneous lack of a nomination for Gerwig and Robbie sends a message that the role he played in the film has garnered more respect. When award shows stand as the arbiters of taste, they can come to define what parts of a project they take seriously through those that they decide to award and promote. This discussion seems to have become a stand-in for serious concerns regarding gender-based discrimination in Hollywood, rather than a discussion specifically about the film.

There is one incredibly important thing to note while discussing all of this: Gosling is not the only actor from Barbie to be nominated at the 96th Oscars. America Ferrera received a nomination for Best Supporting Actress, which doesn’t seem to be discussed thoroughly, or sometimes at all, within this “controversy.” Some discussions online seem to be disregarding this fact in favor of painting a narrative of “snubbing.” Ferrera is nominated for her first Oscar, and her performance was certainly the most emotionally moving of the film. Yet, that achievement is not getting nearly as much attention.

People are angry at the Ryan Gosling acting nomination, yet don’t mention in the same conversation the woman from the same movie who was. This transforms this discussion into not just the Academy valuing a man more than his female coworkers, but a mass populace that ignores the recognition of a woman of color from the same movie while outcrying “misogyny.” It goes to reaffirm concerns about intersectionality regarding Barbie when fans only are vocal about the white women who weren’t nominated, rather than the woman of color who was.

It’s also worth noting that the film still received many nominations, including the screenplay that Gerwig was nominated for, and a nomination for Best Picture, which still recognizes Robbie as the producer. Saying that “Gerwig and Robbie were snubbed” is a bright and poppy headline to try and discuss misogyny in Hollywood, but it holds very little substance when examined. Simply, they were not snubbed, and making a big deal of it only distracts from the women who were nominated at the Oscars. The Academy, also, likely wouldn’t have nominated Barbie for half of the awards it did if it wasn’t the cultural phenomenon it was.

If the Academy wanted to avoid backlash while still playing into public opinion, they could have either nominated everyone or nominated no one. I believe they were trying to appease a general audience when nominating Barbie for so many awards, they just may have miscalculated how to go about that. Could they have easily nominated Gerwig or Robbie? Probably. Should they have? Probably not.

It doesn’t entirely matter though, because the Academy will do what they always do: nominate whatever they’d like, and disregard criticisms (valid or not), because everyone will forget about it within a couple of weeks.

In my personal opinion, I don’t think Ryan Gosling should have been nominated for an Oscar for his portrayal of Ken. Not because I don’t think he did a good job or because I feel that Gerwig and Robbie were snubbed, but for a completely unrelated reason. Charles Melton had one of the best performances of the entire year in May December, and nobody can tell me his performance was less worthy of recognition than Ryan Gosling playing a doll. And this is, once again, coming from someone who genuinely enjoyed Barbie and has a collection of expensive fashion dolls.